


as the crooked smiles fade

by basementhero



Series: the boys time can't capture [2]
Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Future Fic, M/M, Post-Band, companion piece to previous work, hint of romantic feelings but not explicitly defined, others come up but aren't central enough to tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-24
Updated: 2015-08-24
Packaged: 2018-04-16 22:45:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4642824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/basementhero/pseuds/basementhero
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry's doing fine without the band. If people would stop bringing it up, he would be even better (he wouldn't have to work so hard to tell himself he's better off now).</p>
            </blockquote>





	as the crooked smiles fade

**Author's Note:**

> the companion piece to "in the end, i'd do it all again" that nobody asked for.
> 
> title is also from Fall Out Boy's "The Kids Aren't Alright"

Harry has a good life in LA. There’s never a lack of something to do or someone to see; his label is supporting talented artists; he’s surrounded by more friends than he could have ever dreamed of. Rarely does he ever lie in bed awake at night and think about regret (that doesn’t mean that it isn’t there, like the faint echo of laughter or the tightly locked door behind which a mass of awards grow dusty). 

2020 was actually a really good year for Harry: he got his solo album finished and pre-orders were much better than he expected, and he added three new tattoos to his collection. Harry even found a ton of questionable shirts to purchase. Gemma was the one who brought it up first, at her wedding reception (where she was supposed to be celebrating, not trying to depress her brother).

“Heard from the lads lately?” She asked casually over champagne even though she knew very well that he hadn’t.

“No.”

“It would be ten years now, wouldn’t it?” Gemma thought she was sly, but Harry had always been able to see past her “casual” questions straight to the heart of what she was getting at.

“We’re not getting back together, Gem.”

She didn’t respond to his firm declaration. Her disappointed look was not quite as intimidating as she thought it was--Harry moved on with the night and with his life just fine despite her disapproval. 

Yes, Harry _loved_ One Direction. In hindsight, he knows he never would’ve survived the fame on his own when he was sixteen. He needed the boys to be there with him, dodging paparazzi and trying to please an insane, though amazing, fanbase. He’s grateful for everything they accomplished together, but it’s been time to move on for years. Harry’s not planning on settling down anytime soon, like Liam, and he’s not got a kid to worry about, like Louis; he’s just got time and space to be his own person. He’s not just a guy in a boyband: people take him seriously (maybe a little _too_ seriously, a tiny, accented whisper in the back of his head would comment if it hadn’t been so thoroughly ignored over the years to the point that it finally stopped trying).

The only thing that ever catches in Harry’s mind like guilt is when he thinks about how he really should have tried harder to keep in contact with everyone. Sure, they weren’t a band anymore; weren’t they still friends? He sees Louis sometimes--Harry will be somewhere and Louis will happen to be at that same somewhere, but they don’t talk. Harry doesn’t even know if Louis notices him, and he’s never had the courage to go up and make him. He’s got a good thing going for himself and he can’t risk being, well...being drowned in nostalgia. He tells himself that he and the boys couldn’t have remained close friends without always having to talk about the band, so it only makes sense that they don’t see each other now. Surely no one wants to get into the gritty details of why they can’t get back together.

No one bothered him about the boys again for a while. The press certainly wasn’t going to do it; no one even remembered One Direction, apparently. That stung a little--a lot, if he’s honest. He’d thought they had done some good work together, touched some lives. His family wouldn’t bring it up either, probably because Gemma told them he was touchy about it or something. It was Ed that opened the floodgates again, and that ginger bastard wasn’t even sorry.

Ed didn’t even _say_ anything about it at first. He and Harry and some others were just sort of milling about at Harry’s place; Ed had a guitar with him (when had he ever not), and at some point the mindless strumming he had going turned too familiar for Harry. 

“Are you serious, mate?” He blurted out when Zayn should’ve started singing.

“Sorry?” Ed offered. His apology was clearly fake since he didn’t have the decency to stop playing. “ _I won’t let these little things slip out of my mouth_ ,” he had the audacity to start softly singing, “ _but if I do, it’s you, oh, it’s you they add up to. I’m in love with you_ \--”

“Stop.”

“It’s just a song, mate,” one of the other traitors Harry called friends said from another part of the room.

“It’s not just a--” Harry decided arguing was pointless, so he instead stood up and walked calmly (stormed) out of his own house, the damn song floating around his ears as he went.

But besides those two disturbances, Harry’s fine. He turns the big three-oh and flies his entire family in for a lavish party (not even once does he do a double take at a flash of blonde hair). He’s working on some new music for himself and writing things for other artists and thinking about maybe signing this girl he got a demo from the other week. His mum asks when he’s going to find a nice girl (or boy, she adds nonchalantly) to start working on grandchildren for her. Harry reminds her that Gemma’s just given her a grandson and can’t she let him do things at his own pace?  
Harry is a romantic at heart--and also quite publicly--but there’s never been something completely _right_ about anyone he’s dated in the last few years. He feels like he’s unfairly comparing everyone he meets to an ideal no one can ever live up to, so he just sticks to casual dates and mutually beneficial one-night-stands. It’s hollow and altogether unsatisfying, but what else can he do?

In mid-April, Harry stays up late on a Wednesday, fiddling with some lyrics he’s had for a while now. He’s just getting to the bridge when his phone alerts him to a Twitter notification; he takes the excuse for a break because he’s getting a bit of a headache.

_@katiekat223: @NiallOfficial @Harry_Styles @onedirection my cousin was feeling down so i pulled this out. brings back memories!!_

He’s not even thinking when he clicks through to the linked video. It’s a terrible decision, he knows, and it’s going to crush all his hard work towards reinventing himself, but he just can’t help it. 

His first thought is literally “ _fuck_.” He is not prepared in the slightest for the rush of emotion that comes at him at the sight of himself and his boys; literally all he can do is sit there, gaping, as the music video plays in front of him. He doesn’t have the mental capacity to think about his old sartorial choices or his hair or how much his voice has matured (all things he notes in the thirtieth and fortieth replays). Harry can’t focus on _anything_ ; it’s far too much to handle.

The first thing he actually can pay attention to on the second go-round is that he and Niall are both wearing dark blue. That thought leads to a mantra of _NiallNiallNiall_ \--every time he starts the video over he’s looking for something to make Niall feel real again. It’s weird and uncomfortable; Harry wants to reach out and poke Niall’s face and touch his hair and stare at his toes and all sorts of other really stupid things. 

Harry misses all of his ex-band members but for some reason Niall makes his heart hurt. Maybe it’s because he can clearly recall all the times he decided to turn away from the other’s attempts to reach out to him--most of them are clearly there on the Internet for everyone to see. Maybe he feels guilty for cutting Niall out of his thoughts the most determinedly. Maybe it’s just because he can picture thousands of moments from practically another lifetime, and in all of them he’d always wanted to shuffle a little closer, hold on a little tighter to his Irish friend. 

Harry eventually thinks to log back into Twitter and see if maybe anything’s changed. He’s not expecting Niall to have responded, but he’s happy to see that the Irishman has. “ _thank you. needed that_ ,” the response says. Harry’s not sure what to make of it.

It takes two days for Harry to get himself to the airport and on a plane to London. He almost goes to Louis, actually. It would’ve been faster, easier since he knew how to find him. Harry would have been able to retreat back to the safety of his own house if (when) everything failed. He doesn’t actually know that Niall still lives in London; Niall could’ve moved back to Ireland to be with his family. Harry hopes the other hasn’t and hopes that he has--the former will make him easier to find, but the latter will mean he’s not as alone and abandoned as Harry’s afraid he might be. Harry’s _not_ responsible for Niall’s happiness, he knows that and he reminds himself, but he kind of wants to be, just a little. He at least wants to be a positively contributing factor. 

Obviously the first place to check, when he lands in his home country for the first time in years, is the flat Niall lived in the last time they’d been in strong enough contact for Harry to ask. He takes a cab, doesn’t care much if anyone spots him but luckily no one does, and gets to the door of Niall’s old flat a lot sooner than he’s prepared for. He doesn’t know what he’s going to say if the door opens and Niall’s actually there.

He rings the bell and waits.

The door swings open and the mouth in front of him moves for a second. Harry can’t hear anything over the rushing in his ears.

“Niall” falls from his lips in a breath just before the door slams closed again in his face.


End file.
